Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul Joins U.S. Representative Pat Ryan to Sound the Alarm on Devastating Impacts of Republicans’ ‘Big Ugly Bill’

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul joined U.S. Representative Pat Ryan, local elected officials, doctors, farmers and non profit workers to sound the alarm on the detrimental effects of President Trump and Congressional Republicans’ “Big Ugly Bill” on New York State.The cuts imposed by Washington Republicans include an anticipated almost $13 billion impact to New York’s health care system, 1.5 million New Yorkers losing their health insurance coverage, and over 300,000 households projected to lose some or all of their SNAP benefits.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page will post photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

 Good morning. Good morning. Oh, here's a fired up crowd. Is this a crowd that likes to fight? Because we're in a hell of a fight right now, my friends. I feel the energy in this room, and first of all, I want to thank my dream team. You heard the commissioners announce, they're the ones whose programs, whose safety net programs that were put in place decades ago to lift people up and help them because we always were a compassionate country. Their agencies are the most affected, so they're here because they're also deeply concerned about this horrible assault on every American in our values.

Two weeks ago, the president signed into law a devastating package of reforms, they call them. You know who likes that? The richest of the rich – the millionaires and billionaires, and meanwhile, they're screwing everybody else. And that's what we're doing today. Talking about the effect here, right in the congressional district of my great friend Pat Ryan. If he looks a little tired, he was voting against bad things and for good things until 1:00 a.m. this morning – Pat Ryan.

You are so fortunate to have him as your voice in Washington. We've been friends a long, long time, and he takes this fight so personally. He's got a young family. He knows what this means for their future, so I want to thank him for being the champion that we need. Also, we have our county executive, Jen Metzger. Thank you. We've worked on so many economic development projects together, working hard. You're going to hear from the Health Alliance in Hudson Valley from Dr. Kenneth Keplinger. I want to thank him for coming here today. Tom Nardacci, the director of the Food Bank.

Now listen, how do you describe what has happened just in the last six months? I talk to so many people. They say, “I just can't watch television, I can't listen to the radio. I can't even look at social media.” It's taking us down. Because no matter what you do, or you think waking up to be a good day, there's something happening out of Washington that just smacks us right down.

And one thing that we treasure in this country, always have, is taking care of people — taking care of people and providing something as basic as health care. That is a basic human right. And now the Republicans in Washington say they don't give a damn. They're taking it away.

Medicaid is a lifeline. One third of all New Yorkers benefit from this program. Half of all children benefit from this program, and 40,000 people right here in this district stand to lose it. These are your friends and neighbors. And for anyone who's not on Medicaid and says, “Well, that doesn't affect me.” Well, guess what happens when rural hospitals close? You're not getting the attention if there's a car accident and your child is hurt or you're having a baby. Where are you going to go? I mean, this has a real effect on everybody. It's going to have a cataclysmic effect on all of our health care provided across the State of New York. This is a concern to everyone, whether you're on Medicaid or not. Also, not only do they want to make Americans unhealthy, they want Americans to be hungry apparently because now they're eliminating programs, scaling them back dramatically. The SNAP program, because we always thought that no one should go hungry because they don't have enough money.

I mean, you want to go back to hearing little kids' tummies growl in school? You want to go back to seniors back in the 1960s? Seniors lived in poverty. The highest rate of poverty was among our seniors. Until we had Medicaid, until we had Medicare, that's when we had an awakening that we have to take care of people. And now to unravel all that in just a few months time, it is shocking. It is shocking. And I'm looking at that in contrast to what we're doing here in the great State of New York.

We just passed an incredible budget, and I want to thank our great senator, you know who she is, Michelle Hinchey. Assemblyman Jonathan Jacobson. Stand up. Stand up. These were great partners of mine when we delivered a transformational budget that put families first. I said that when I had my state of the state address back in January, families come first. That's my top priority, and it's easy for me to say that because I'm New York's first mom governor, and I became a grandma again this week.

So it's personal to all of us, and what I said was, our families are struggling. Especially in our small communities, beautiful places like Kingston, and we have our mayor, Steve Noble here, who's been a great friend of mine as well, Steve Noble. We walked the streets. Little communities like this in our rural areas.

I said they're struggling. I go into the diners, I talk to the farmers. In Congress, I represented the most Republican rural district in the State of New York. I know how people are hurting. And what do we do about it in the state legislature? We said, “We need to put more money back in your pockets.” So as a result of what we just accomplished, we have a thousand dollars for a child under the age of four for their parents to help lift them up to buy the diapers and formula, and all the clothes that they keep out growing.

I'm buying my grandbaby clothes, zero to three, three to six, six to nine. They never stop growing. And you think about the kids who are school age going off and have to get the new backpacks and the sneakers in a few weeks. Guess what? Because of tariffs and the additional cost of everything — the Trump tariff tax — a pair of sneakers that once cost $55 will now be $72 — 40 percent increase in a pair of sneakers.

So I said we have to do something. A thousand dollars for families with children under the age of four — $500, if you've got older children. A middle class tax cut, the largest tax rate cut in 70 years, more money back in people’s pockets.

And I mentioned hungry kids, New York State will — for the first time ever— provide for free the cost of every child's lunch and breakfast in school, so no child goes hungry. So it all adds up to about $5,000 back in families’ pockets. But on the other hand, we've got the tariffs taking money out. We have health care cuts. Who's going to cover the cost of people's health care? They're never going to get ahead. And that is so, so frustrating. People feel like no one's listening to them anymore.

We are fighting for people here in the State of New York – you know that. And we're going to make sure they have the dignity of housing, health care and education. We fight those fights, but we've always had partners in Washington. Even under Republican Presidents, they never took away the basic fundamental programs that help people stay out of poverty. And that's exactly what's happening now. And I'm sick and tired of it. I have talked to so many people who are living in this world of anxiety. “What's going to happen to us? How are we going to get out of this? How do we fight back?” And I'll tell you this, there are seven Republican members of Congress in this State who literally voted against the interest of their districts, the people put them in office.

Now, that's not a real good strategy for reelection, is it? When people understand that you may have fooled them once, but you won't fool them twice, and that's what we're coming out against here. And this is not a political rally, so I won't talk about campaigns. But we need to have different people representing all of our districts who actually have a heart, who have compassion, who care about the people who put them in office.

So we have got a fight on our hands. It's big, what they call a reconciliation, you can get a lecture and all the procedures from our congressman here, but what they just did isn't the end of the story. They have another budget coming out in the fall and that's where all the people they didn't hurt the first time around better watch out because they don't seem to care about anyone. And I'll tell you this, as long as I have a breath in my body, I will stand up and fight this assault on people across America, but particularly here in the great State of New York because that's what we do as New Yorkers. We are fighters. We don't get pushed around. We're tough, we're resilient. We're compassionate. We care about people.

And I'll close with this. This is a moment in history which we viewed as a dark, dark time, but how do we bring light back? It's the mobilization of ordinary people who never got involved in challenging their government, standing up, fighting back. We never got together in groups, online, in person. People who never got involved because everything was okay. My friends, it's not okay anymore. It's not okay anymore. And if you're doing okay yourself, you have a neighbor who's not; you have a farmer down the road who's worried about the immigration raids, where they're trying to let people have the dignity of work that others will not do. These are hardworking people, who help us every single day. Leave them alone. Leave them alone.

I mean, the stories are heartbreaking of what these ICE agents are doing — showing up literally at 6:00 a.m. at a farm in Sackets Harbor, coincidentally it’s Tom Homan's hometown. He's the head of ICE, right? Or he manages all this. He's the ICE king, right? He's the one who says, wear the dark mess, scare the hell out of everybody, carry your guns and you walk into a house with a third grader sleeping — take her and her brothers, her twin brothers in high school, take the mom and put them in a detention center down in Texas. That happened in our State, my friends, and I'm still pissed off about it. I will never get over the fear that child must have had when she was woken by these agents. And where was dad? Dad was already up at 6:00 AM milking the cows because that's what hardworking farm workers do. And these are immigrants doing these jobs. I had a call with Tom Homan. I said, I want them home. You bring them home. They did nothing wrong.

And after a Republican part of our State and a Republican farmer literally it is called old McDonald's farm. It's been there for five generations where this happened. They all rallied with the school superintendent and the businesses and the whole community came together — a thousand people. I'm not sure they even have that population there. They stood up and said, “No, this has gone too far.” That's what I'm talking about. Ordinary people unexpectedly thrust into this, who stand up and have the courage to say, “No, that's not who we are as Americans. That's not who we are as New Yorkers.”

So, I believe that we have the power to harness the voices of people, whether the small businesses are hurt, because the Canadians won't come here anymore, go to the North Country. It's sad. I was just there. They're not coming to the businesses, the hotels, the conventions are being canceled. People are selling their houses, all because of painful words spoken by our President to destroy a relationship that goes back hundreds of years. So, you've got the tourism ministry affected — small downtown businesses, our farmers, health care, our hospitals under siege now — all the workers will lose their jobs and an estimated 68,000 health care workers in New York alone will lose their jobs if these cuts continue. And families wondering why they can no longer use food stamps at the farmer's market.

This is what we're fighting for. This is who we are. This is when we stand up. Let's show them who we are as New Yorkers and try to change the course of history and say we care about people. This is the great State of New York. Thank you everyone for being on the side of doing what's right, standing up, not taking this, fighting back.

Thank you. Thank you.

And I cannot think of another person I want at my side during this fight for the ages than our Congressman Pat Ryan.